Model Inspection¶

Load the selected model¶

import os
import re
import pickle
import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
import warnings
from gensim.test.utils import datapath
import pyLDAvis
import pyLDAvis.gensim
import gensim.corpora as corpora
from gensim.matutils import Sparse2Corpus

warnings.filterwarnings("ignore", category=FutureWarning)

# Load selected model
models_dir = datapath("train_models\\")
selected_model = "nb5_na04_a1_b1_models.pkl"
with open(os.path.join(models_dir, selected_model), "rb") as handle:
    model = pickle.load(handle)

a1_b1_k20 = model["a1_b1_k20"]

# Load dictionary 
dictionary = corpora.Dictionary.load(datapath("vocabulary\\{}".format("nb5_na04")))

# load trained bigram
filename = datapath('train_bigram\\{}_bigram.pkl'.format("nb5_na04"))
with open(filename, "rb") as f:
    train_bigram = pickle.load(f)
    
# Load train data
df_train = pd.read_csv('.\\Datasource_backup\\sub_onetree_train.csv')

X_train = train_bigram.transform(df_train['clean_text'].tolist())
corpus = Sparse2Corpus(X_train, documents_columns=False)

pyLDAvis¶

INTERPRETATION¶

Output: probability mass function over the words in the model for each topic
Scatter plot: distance between topics in the scatter plot is an approximation of the difference between topic distribution (approximation of the semantic relationship)
Bubble size: is the topic prevalence
Indices inside the bubbles: indicate the sorted topic prevalence. Bubble number 1 is the most popular topic to the last
Bar: list top 30 words given the topic
Red bars: frequency of each word given a topic
Gray bars: overall word frequency
How other topics use the word?: Visualize the unexplained portion of a words within a topic by simply going with the mouse over the word
Distance between circles: represents topic similarity (approx to the original topic similarity matrix, since we are using a two dimensional scatter plot). t-distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding and/or Multidimensional Scaling do their best to preserve the original distance.

INTERFER MEANING¶

Interactively tune relevance metric (parameter lambda) to introduce new words that are specific to the topic.
Decreasing lambda more weight on the ratio red to gray (word's frequency within the topic to the overall word's frequency). This can improve readability for those who are not familiar with the topic.

# Visualize the topics using Jensen-Shannon Divergence & t-distributed Stochastic Neighbor Em
pyLDAvis.enable_notebook()
vis = pyLDAvis.gensim.prepare(a1_b1_k20, corpus, dictionary, mds='TSNE')
vis

# Visualize the topics using ensen-Shannon Divergence & Principal Coordinate Analysis(aka Classical Multidimensional Scaling)
pyLDAvis.enable_notebook()
vis = pyLDAvis.gensim.prepare(a1_b1_k20, corpus, dictionary)
vis

Informative topics - categories:¶

Index pyLDAvis	Inferred topic	LDA topic number
1	Broad topic regarding Automation - Devices - Network	19
2	Smart lights	18
3	Smart termostat	9
4	Home entertainment - voice assistant	7
5	Audio - Speakers	4
6	Smart Lock systems	16
8	Smart camera - surveillance	15
9	Smart plugs - power systems	11
10	Smart door systems	5

Summary output:¶

Find the topic with the highest contribution for each document:¶

# Find the topic number with the highest 
def dominant_topic(ldamodel, corpus, document):
    # init dataframe
    topics_df = pd.DataFrame()

    # GET MAIN TOPIC IN EACH DOCUMENT
    # Get throught the pages
    for num, doc in enumerate(ldamodel[corpus]):
        # Count number of list into a list
        if sum(isinstance(i, list) for i in doc)>0:
            doc = doc[0]

        doc = sorted(doc, key= lambda x: (x[1]), reverse=True)
    
        for j, (topic_num, prop_topic) in enumerate(doc):
            if j == 0: # => dominant topic
                # Get list prob. * keywords from the topic
                pk = ldamodel.show_topic(topic_num)
                topic_keywords = ', '.join([word for word, prop in pk])
                # Add topic number, probability, keywords and original text to the dataframe
                topics_df = topics_df.append(pd.Series([int(topic_num), np.round(prop_topic, 4),
                                                    topic_keywords, document[num]]),
                                                    ignore_index=True)
            else:
                break
                
    # Add columns name
    topics_df.columns = ['Dominant_Topic', '%_Contribution', 'Topic_Keywords', 'Text']

    return topics_df


df_dominant_topic = dominant_topic(a1_b1_k20, corpus, df_train['text'])

df_dominant_topic.head(10)

Example:¶

Original submission and tree text

print(df_train["text"][0])

Worthwhile smart home devices? <SUB> So my home just became smart today, and my main reason is to be able to use Alexa to make my life easier. As a wheelchair user, this is a great thing as I no longer have to for someone to turn on my lights for me. 

I bought the wink hub for its compatibility with so many things, yet I feel like spending 100 dollars on a hub that only controls 5 bulbs. 

Are there any must have devices for a smart home? 
Especially any recommendations for a wheelchair user? 

I thought about a smart garage door opener, but ours still works fine, and is probably too old for any retrofit type adapter. (20 yr old lift master)

I was hoping they made a (not uber expensive) handicap-like door opener. Like the ones at stores.

If r/smarthome has any recommendations let me know. <SUB> Well, the Wink speaks many languages, that's for sure.  Good choice, in my opinion.

As for what could work for you?  This door closer can handle a 35 pound door:

http://www.epivots.com/mpowr-mp-800.aspx

I'm sure you can get one for heavier doors.  And your garage door may be modified, as well.  If it will work with a remote control, Chamberlain may be able to help you:

https://www.chamberlain.com/smartphone-control-products/smartphone-garage-door-openers

I am going to suggest that you don't invest in smart bulbs.  Invest instead in smart light switches to control dumb bulbs.  One switch can control multiple lights on a circuit.  

A smart thermostat might be nice, as well.  The Ecobee4 can interface with your network, plus you can pair it with remote sensors, to better control your environment, and save on those power and fuel bills.

You may want to look into controls for your blinds and curtains.  Can be voice controlled, or set up to operate on a schedule. <NEW TIER> I have everything here and can confirm it all works wonderfully.  <SAME TIER> I intended to get a switch, but in my bathroom, I didn't have a neutral wire, and in my bedroom I'm only using it my lamp (single bulb). Most switch boxes in my house have multiple switches in them, so those should accept a smart switch.

I got the Sengled element classic bulb, which are at least pretty cheap ($10). <NEW TIER> Excellent.  This weekend I'm going to be putting four Sylvania Ultra IQ flood lights under the eaves of the place for security lighting.  The Wink offers a "moonlight" lighting scheme.  I'll check it out and see if I like it. <NEW TIER> Good call on the Sylvania bulbs. The Phillips Hue just cost too much. I want as few hubs as possible for my smart home.

Assigned topics oredered by their contribution

sorted(a1_b1_k20[corpus][0][0], key= lambda x: (x[1]), reverse=True)

[(18, 0.47379008),
 (19, 0.18784444),
 (5, 0.17691943),
 (9, 0.057668768),
 (7, 0.022504669),
 (0, 0.015226694)]

Find the most representative document for each topic in order to infer the topic:¶

df_topic_sorted = pd.DataFrame()
df_topic_grouped = df_dominant_topic.groupby('Dominant_Topic')

for i, grp in df_topic_grouped:
    # populate the sorted dataframe with the document that contributed the most to the topic
    df_topic_sorted = pd.concat([df_topic_sorted, grp.sort_values(['%_Contribution'], ascending = [0]).head(1)], axis = 0)
    
# Reset Index and change columns name
df_topic_sorted.columns = ['Topic_Num', "Topic_Perc_Contrib", "Keywords", "Text"]

df_topic_sorted.loc[df_topic_sorted["Topic_Num"].isin([19, 18, 9, 7, 4, 16, 15, 11, 5])]

Example:¶

Most representative text for topic 19 (Broad topic regarding Automation - Devices - Network):

print(df_train["text"][3327])

SmartThing Support is asking me to open ports to the interwebs <SUB> EDIT 3: New hub arrived - immediately updated itself after being plugged in. Something had gone wrong with my old hub the no amount of resets could fix.

I did notice some physical differences between my "old" v2 hub and the "new" v2 hub they mailed me. Perhaps there have been some improvements with a newer revision.

Once everything was migrated, the new hub did solve my original problem (with camera live stream) and all is well. Still waiting in the store credit I was promised...

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

EDIT 2: Samsung is shipping me a new hub, and gave me a little store credit since I will now have to re-pair 25 individual "things" with the new hub plus re-make my routines. What fun!!!

[kodack10's suggestion](https://www.reddit.com/r/homeautomation/comments/5fiuco/smartthing_support_is_asking_me_to_open_ports_to/dakteb4/) was ultimately the test that decided it (take my router out of the equation entirely). My ST hub cannot keep a connection to the ST update service even when the ST hub is directly connected to the internet. From the ST logs, all appears well and normal *except* that connections to update keep getting reset. It was agreed that something was happening with the ST hub - it's not something with the interwebs in general.

In the end, I have no definitive answer as to the cause, but the ST hub I have (v2) seems to be unable to keep a connection to their update servers - and Samsung is fairly certain that my camera issue will be resolved by a new hub with updated firmware.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

EDIT: I should say that, in the grand scheme of things, Samsung's ST support has been absolutely exemplary. Having been the manager of a telephone help desk, I understand entirely the need for scripts and the need to have the consumer at the other end of the phone follow along with the script.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

ORIGINAL POST:
I'm having an issue with some cameras, and in the process of troubleshooting we've discovered that my SmartThings v2 hub will not take firmware updates. As the title says, ST support is asking me to open ports to the interwebs. I am having a *very* hard time accepting that this could be necessary with a consumer/home appliance, and I would never do this otherwise for any reason.

Has anyone received this same advice from ST support, and what was the outcome?

FWIW, the ports they want opened are: 11111, 9443, 443, 39500, 37, and 123. I would have expected that any requests start at my hub (outbound) - not the other way around. This is a troubling development that makes me worry about my choice of ST.
 <SUB> If it turns out that this is necessary then I am never buying SmartThings. I guess if support is trying to initiate the connection from outside your network then this "makes sense" for lack of a better word. Ports 37 and 123 are time services, which makes all this sound even stranger to me. Why on Earth would it need to provide time services to support or anything else outside your network? You don't have multiple routers/firewalls on your network right? <NEW TIER> Or put another way: why is my ST hub the only device ever that can't use NTP without port forwarding? The whole thing is troubling - they need to initiate an inbound connection on an NTP port? What???

&gt;You don't have multiple routers/firewalls on your network right?

As you could have guessed, of course not. I have a very standard home network set-up (which works in its standard configuration with everything else that's connected).

&gt; If it turns out that this is necessary then I am never buying SmartThings.

I'm about two days away from a new post: "I'm dumping ST, so what is the gold standard for HA hubs/controllers?" <NEW TIER> Gold standard is HomeSeer, bit expensive though <SAME TIER> &gt; Or put another way: why is my ST hub the only device ever that can't use NTP without port forwarding?

Most likely there is an internal knowledge base that notes that port 123 is necessary for NTP, and the support engineers are unfamiliar with the distinction between source and destination port and how that interacts with NAT.  It is technically correct that port 123 needs to be "open" in "both directions", and the distinction that the connection is initiated inside-to-out and that stateful firewalls will automatically allow return traffic is-- again-- not one that most tier 1 support techs will understand.

In fact, it is entirely possible if you were using an older tech firewall or something higher end like a Cisco ASA that it would NOT allow return traffic without an explicit rule in your ACL (*allow inbound established*).  While its unlikely you would have such a thing, such knowledge dies hard, particularly when there is a grain of historical truth in it.

All of this leads to tech support who has neither the knowledge nor the inclination to distinguish between inbound and outbound ACLs and ports, and-- to avoid dumb calls with customers who are similarly clueless-- they simply say "open the port" because THEIR incentive is to solve the problem ASAP regardless of what state it leaves your firewall.

And if you think this is unique to SmartThings or prosumer gear, I have news for you.  We run into this at work with enterprise support.  Your enterprise SAN support contract means you get someone who understands storage really really well, but says nothing as to his networking chops or whether he understands how wireshark or windows firewall work. <SAME TIER> If you move to home-assistant.io you also don't have to worry about when Samsung will decide to shutdown smartthings causing it to stop working.   <SAME TIER> So strange. You ought to be able to just download a firmware file on your laptop and then upload it to the hub via a web interface, like pretty much every piece of network gear ever. <NEW TIER> This would probably be my next option - why fool around? <SAME TIER> I may ask for a pi for Christmas... <SAME TIER> My main concern right now is that opening/mapping ports will "fix" the problem - though that wouldn't convince me that the problem was my simple consumer hub or missing port mappings. I'm not a server farm and I shouldn't be in the business of accepting novel inbound connections on an array of ports.

Anyhow, based on your comment, I'm probably singing to the choir... <SAME TIER> Yeah... that's not how ST works... <NEW TIER> Can't argue with that logic :) <SAME TIER> I bet with enough poking around you could decipher how they push the firmware and do something similar.  I rather intend to do this, myself, once I get my home firewall in proper order and can start intercepting comms. <NEW TIER> You know, I am cheap and I do love to tinker so home assistant is enticing. I have a dev/systems background so there are no technical barriers whatsoever.

But as they say, everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. Do I really want to be "tinkering" with the thing that controls my house should an upgrade go wrong or a security flaw be revealed the day before a two week vacation? Like my car, something that just works would be good.

All that said, can I assume your experience has been stellar? From your flair, I see you drive a Cadillac (the S6). <SAME TIER> The hubs are connected to the service already.  Otherwise nothing would work.

The way this works around the firewalling is the ST hub simply phones home to the server. <NEW TIER> That is one of the major reasons I chose HomeSeer was that once setup it requires no tinkering and is super reliable (99.99%).  You could try out both HomeSeer and home assistant before you decided on using one or the other.  Yes the S6 is the highest tier of physical controller they have but you can buy the software and load it onto any hardware if you wanted.  My experience has been perfect. <SAME TIER> This gal/guy gets it!

Most representative text for topic 4 (Audio - Speakers):

print(df_train["text"][775])

Google Home AND Alexa everywhere VS whole apartment audio with a high-quality receiver <SUB> So basically after reading a lot, I've decided to go with both Google Home and Alexa as I believe they kinda complement each other.  


That's OK - filling all the rooms with Google Home Minis and Amazon Echo Dots is definitely doable and given coming Black Friday deals it's not even that expensive.  


However, this gets more complicated. I would also like to have a whole apartment audio system - so that I can play music on my DENON/Onkyo/Yamaha/Sony/whatever receiver (with it's 7.2.4 speakers) but also using all my smart speakers in each and every room for it at the same time.  


So far I haven't found any ways of doing that.  


1. DENON only supports HEOS (but I really like DENON!), which means I end up with ridiculous 3 speakers in each and every room (HEOS, GH, Amazon) from which only one plays at any given time. However it has an ethernet port (which is an additional advantage for me), does have a superior sound quality I believe and is fully waterproof.
2. There are some receivers with Chromecast support, which I guess means that I can get the number of devices down to 2 in each and every room but then Amazon Echo is silent and also I'm not 100% sold on GH sound quality.
3. Sonos sounds like a good way to do a multi-room audio, (has an ethernet port), and has Alexa built-in (but it's not fully integrated? like a 1-to-1 replacement?) so that might also get down number of speakers in each and every room down to 2, with hopefully better sound quality then GH+Alexa pair, is splashproof, but it also requires an additional purchase called 'Sonos Connect', right?  


What is the best approach here? <SUB> 100% overkill. What’s the point in having a high quality audio system and pushing it through a shitty speaker? Why would you just go all Echo dots and have an “everywhere” group for audio?  <NEW TIER> because then you have both great audio in your living room for movies/parties AND the sound continues to be with you to a bathroom, etc AND you have a bunch of smart speakers everywhere that you can interact with

Verify assigned topics oredered by their contribution for the following text

print(df_train["text"][5860])

Smart lights but dumb switches <SUB> How do you guys deal with dumb switches connected to your smart lights? I've got a lot of smart products set up, but I've never bitten on the lights. Beyond exterior.

I'm thinking of dipping my toes into them, but I don't want to have to tell Google to turn my God damn lights on and off every single time. I know my wife would be pissed of the baby was sleeping and I had to okay Google! turn the.. . OKAY GOOGLE. HEY GOOGLE. TURN THE LIGHTS OFF!

And I know I'd be pissed if everytime I DID ask Google or my IFTTT attempted to turn them on the dumb switch was blocking them from receiving the command.

So smart bulbs. Once you buy in, are you all just going around yelling commands at your alexa/home everytime you need to take a piss? <SUB> Just use switch covers. I have fifty smart bulbs in my house and it works well.

sorted(a1_b1_k20[corpus][5860][0], key= lambda x: (x[1]), reverse=True)

[(17, 0.46320614), (18, 0.23434256), (7, 0.17727092), (19, 0.010997688)]

Return the topics based on a word query¶

a1_b1_k20.get_term_topics('security', minimum_probability=0.001)

[(9, 0.0020087508), (15, 0.00354912), (19, 0.0021285776)]

a1_b1_k20.get_term_topics('privacy', minimum_probability=0.0001)

[(19, 0.0003161084)]

a1_b1_k20.get_term_topics('trust', minimum_probability=0.0001)

[(19, 0.00038578294)]

a1_b1_k20.get_term_topics('connectivity', minimum_probability=0.0001)

[(12, 0.00051127264), (19, 0.0002805013)]

a1_b1_k20.get_term_topics('personal', minimum_probability=0.0001)

[(4, 0.00015831692), (19, 0.0002335844)]

Topic distribution across documents¶

# To check how widely a topic was discussed

# Number of documents for each topic
topic_counts = df_dominant_topic['Dominant_Topic'].value_counts()

# Percentage of Documents for each Topic
topic_contribution = np.round(topic_counts/topic_counts.sum(), 4)

# Topic Number and Keywords
topic_num_keywords = df_topic_sorted[['Topic_Num', 'Keywords']].set_index(df_topic_sorted['Topic_Num'])

df_dominant_topics = pd.concat([topic_num_keywords, topic_counts, topic_contribution], axis = 1)

df_dominant_topics.reset_index(drop = True, inplace = True)
df_dominant_topics.columns = ['Topic_Num', 'Topic_Keywords', 'Num_Documents', 'Perc_Documents']

df_dominant_topics

Word coluds of Top N Keywords in Each Topic¶

# with the size of the words proportional to the weight
from wordcloud import WordCloud

cloud = WordCloud(background_color='white',
                  width=2500,
                  height=1800,
                  max_words=50,
                  color_func=lambda *args, **kwargs: list(list(mcolors.TABLEAU_COLORS.values())*2)[i],
                  prefer_horizontal=1.0)

topics = a1_b1_k20.show_topics(num_topics=20, num_words=50, formatted=False)
topics = [(x, dist) for (x, dist) in topics if x in [19, 18, 9, 7, 4, 16, 15, 11, 5]]
topic_num = [x for (x, dist) in topics]


fig, axes = plt.subplots(3, 3, figsize=(70,100), sharex=True, sharey=True)

for i, ax in enumerate(axes.flatten()):
    fig.add_subplot(ax)
    topic_words = dict(topics[i][1])
    cloud.generate_from_frequencies(topic_words, max_font_size=300)
    plt.gca().imshow(cloud)
    plt.gca().set_title('Topic ' + str(topic_num[i]), fontdict=dict(size=200))
    plt.gca().axis('off')

plt.subplots_adjust(wspace=0, hspace=0.01)
plt.axis('off')
plt.margins(x=0, y=0)
plt.tight_layout()
plt.show()

Plot word counts and the weights of each keyword in the same chart¶

# Keep an eye on common words that occur in multiple topics and the one
# whose relative frequency is more than the weight. >> those should be added to stop_words

topics = a1_b1_k20.show_topics(num_topics = 20, num_words = 20, formatted=False)
topics = [(x, dist) for (x, dist) in topics if x in [19, 18, 9, 7, 4, 16, 15, 11, 5]]
topic_num = [x for (x, dist) in topics]


def corpus2token_text(corpus, dictionary):
    nested_doc = []
    texts = []
    for doc in corpus:
        nested_doc.append([[dictionary[k]]*v for (k, v) in doc])
    for doc in nested_doc:
        texts.append([item for sublist in doc for item in sublist])
    return texts

texts = corpus2token_text(corpus, dictionary)

data_flat = [word for doc in texts for word in doc]

# words stored as dict keys and their count as dict values
counter = Counter(data_flat)

out = []
for num, dist in topics:
    # relative weight to the topic
    for word, weight in dist:
        out.append([word, num, weight, counter[word]])

df = pd.DataFrame(out, columns=['word', 'topic_id', 'weight', 'word_count'])    

# Plot Word Count and Weights of Topic Keywords
fig, axes = plt.subplots(3, 3, figsize=(150,100), sharey=True, dpi=160)
cols = list(list(mcolors.TABLEAU_COLORS.values())*2)
for i, ax in enumerate(axes.flatten()):
    ax.bar(x='word', height="word_count", data=df.loc[df.topic_id==topic_num[i], :], color=cols[i], width=0.5, alpha=0.3, label='Word Count')
    ax_twin = ax.twinx()
    ax_twin.bar(x='word', height="weight", data=df.loc[df.topic_id==topic_num[i], :], color=cols[i], width=0.2, label='Weights')
    ax.set_ylabel('Word Count', color=cols[i], fontsize=70)
    ax_twin.set_ylim(0.0001, 0.0500); ax.set_ylim(0, 10000)
    ax.set_title('Topic: ' + str(topic_num[i]), color=cols[i], fontsize=100)
    ax.tick_params(axis='y', left=False, labelsize=70)
    ax_twin.tick_params(axis='y', labelsize=70)
    ax.set_xticklabels(df.loc[df.topic_id==topic_num[i], 'word'], rotation=30, horizontalalignment= 'right', fontsize=70)
    ax.legend(loc='upper left', fontsize=70); ax_twin.legend(loc='upper right', fontsize=70)

fig.tight_layout(w_pad=2)    
fig.suptitle('Word Count and weight of Topic Keywords', fontsize=200, y=1.05)    
plt.show()

Jensen-Shannon Distance¶

A measure that we can use to find the similarity between the two probability distributions. 0 indicates that the two distributions are the same, and 1 would indicate that they are nowhere similar.

$JSD(P||Q)=\sqrt{\frac{D(P||M)+D(Q||M)}{2}}$

Where P & Q are the two probability distribution, M = (P+Q)/2, and D(P||M) is the KLD between P and M. Similarly D(Q||M) is the KLD between Q and M.

# Calculate Jensen-Shannon distance between two probability distributions using scipy.stats.entropy.
# Create Document - Topic Matrix

# column names
topicnames = ["Topic" + str(i) for i in range(len(a1_b1_k20.print_topics(num_topics=20)))]

# index names
docnames = ["Doc" + str(i) for i in range(df_train.shape[0])]

# Make the pandas dataframe
doc_topic = pd.DataFrame(columns=topicnames, index=docnames)

# Populate the matrix with topic probability distribution for a document
for doc_num, dist in enumerate(a1_b1_k20[corpus]):
    for i in dist[0]:
        doc_topic.iloc[doc_num,i[0]] = i[1]

doc_topic = doc_topic.fillna(0)

doc_topic[:3]

# DOCUMENT BY DOCUMENT JENSENSHANNON CALCULATION
# dictionary implementation
from scipy.spatial import distance
js_dict = {}

for r in np.array(range(df.shape[0])):
    for c in np.array(range(df.shape[0])):
        if c <= r:
            pass
        else:
            js_dict[str(r)+'-'+str(c)] = distance.jensenshannon(doc_topic.iloc[r,:], doc_topic.iloc[c,:])

# Get reference document by topic and the related ones top 3 for topics of interest
target_topics = [19, 18, 9, 7, 4, 16]

for i in target_topics:
    print('\n\nTOPIC:', i)
    doc_index = df_topic_sorted.index[df_topic_sorted['Topic_Num'] == i][0]
    print('KEYWORDS:', df_topic_sorted.loc[doc_index, 'Keywords'])
    print('REFERENCE COMMENT:', doc_index)
    print('TEXT: \n', df_train['text'][doc_index])
    new = {}
    for j in [k for k in js_dict.keys()]:
        # Extract the key's values with the document
        if str(doc_index) in np.array(re.findall(r'(\d*)-(\d*)', j)[0]):
            new[j] = js_dict[j]
    # subset for documents with js under threshold
    # new = dict((k, v) for k, v in new.items() if v < 0.4)
    # sort turn a dictionary to a list of tuple
    new = sorted(new.items(), key=lambda x: x[1], reverse=False)
    # Extract the top 3
    new = new[:3]
    print('\nRELATED COMMENTS: ')
    for docs, val in new:
        # extract document number different from reference document
        num = re.findall(r'(\d*)-(\d*)', docs)[0]
        j = [j for j in num if j != str(doc_index)][0]
        print('DOCUMENT: ', j)
        print('JSD SCORE: ', val)
        print('TEXT: \n', df_train['text'][int(j)])
    #related_comments = np.where((js_matrix.iloc[doc_index] < 0.1) &
    #                            (js_matrix.index != doc_index))[0]
    #print('Related comments: ')
    #for j in related_comments:
    #    print('https:www.reddit.com{}'.format(df['permalink'][j]))


TOPIC: 19
KEYWORDS: device, hub, go, wifi, thing, automation, good, need, make, system
REFERENCE COMMENT: 3327
TEXT: 
 SmartThing Support is asking me to open ports to the interwebs <SUB> EDIT 3: New hub arrived - immediately updated itself after being plugged in. Something had gone wrong with my old hub the no amount of resets could fix.

I did notice some physical differences between my "old" v2 hub and the "new" v2 hub they mailed me. Perhaps there have been some improvements with a newer revision.

Once everything was migrated, the new hub did solve my original problem (with camera live stream) and all is well. Still waiting in the store credit I was promised...

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

EDIT 2: Samsung is shipping me a new hub, and gave me a little store credit since I will now have to re-pair 25 individual "things" with the new hub plus re-make my routines. What fun!!!

[kodack10's suggestion](https://www.reddit.com/r/homeautomation/comments/5fiuco/smartthing_support_is_asking_me_to_open_ports_to/dakteb4/) was ultimately the test that decided it (take my router out of the equation entirely). My ST hub cannot keep a connection to the ST update service even when the ST hub is directly connected to the internet. From the ST logs, all appears well and normal *except* that connections to update keep getting reset. It was agreed that something was happening with the ST hub - it's not something with the interwebs in general.

In the end, I have no definitive answer as to the cause, but the ST hub I have (v2) seems to be unable to keep a connection to their update servers - and Samsung is fairly certain that my camera issue will be resolved by a new hub with updated firmware.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

EDIT: I should say that, in the grand scheme of things, Samsung's ST support has been absolutely exemplary. Having been the manager of a telephone help desk, I understand entirely the need for scripts and the need to have the consumer at the other end of the phone follow along with the script.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = 

ORIGINAL POST:
I'm having an issue with some cameras, and in the process of troubleshooting we've discovered that my SmartThings v2 hub will not take firmware updates. As the title says, ST support is asking me to open ports to the interwebs. I am having a *very* hard time accepting that this could be necessary with a consumer/home appliance, and I would never do this otherwise for any reason.

Has anyone received this same advice from ST support, and what was the outcome?

FWIW, the ports they want opened are: 11111, 9443, 443, 39500, 37, and 123. I would have expected that any requests start at my hub (outbound) - not the other way around. This is a troubling development that makes me worry about my choice of ST.
 <SUB> If it turns out that this is necessary then I am never buying SmartThings. I guess if support is trying to initiate the connection from outside your network then this "makes sense" for lack of a better word. Ports 37 and 123 are time services, which makes all this sound even stranger to me. Why on Earth would it need to provide time services to support or anything else outside your network? You don't have multiple routers/firewalls on your network right? <NEW TIER> Or put another way: why is my ST hub the only device ever that can't use NTP without port forwarding? The whole thing is troubling - they need to initiate an inbound connection on an NTP port? What???

&gt;You don't have multiple routers/firewalls on your network right?

As you could have guessed, of course not. I have a very standard home network set-up (which works in its standard configuration with everything else that's connected).

&gt; If it turns out that this is necessary then I am never buying SmartThings.

I'm about two days away from a new post: "I'm dumping ST, so what is the gold standard for HA hubs/controllers?" <NEW TIER> Gold standard is HomeSeer, bit expensive though <SAME TIER> &gt; Or put another way: why is my ST hub the only device ever that can't use NTP without port forwarding?

Most likely there is an internal knowledge base that notes that port 123 is necessary for NTP, and the support engineers are unfamiliar with the distinction between source and destination port and how that interacts with NAT.  It is technically correct that port 123 needs to be "open" in "both directions", and the distinction that the connection is initiated inside-to-out and that stateful firewalls will automatically allow return traffic is-- again-- not one that most tier 1 support techs will understand.

In fact, it is entirely possible if you were using an older tech firewall or something higher end like a Cisco ASA that it would NOT allow return traffic without an explicit rule in your ACL (*allow inbound established*).  While its unlikely you would have such a thing, such knowledge dies hard, particularly when there is a grain of historical truth in it.

All of this leads to tech support who has neither the knowledge nor the inclination to distinguish between inbound and outbound ACLs and ports, and-- to avoid dumb calls with customers who are similarly clueless-- they simply say "open the port" because THEIR incentive is to solve the problem ASAP regardless of what state it leaves your firewall.

And if you think this is unique to SmartThings or prosumer gear, I have news for you.  We run into this at work with enterprise support.  Your enterprise SAN support contract means you get someone who understands storage really really well, but says nothing as to his networking chops or whether he understands how wireshark or windows firewall work. <SAME TIER> If you move to home-assistant.io you also don't have to worry about when Samsung will decide to shutdown smartthings causing it to stop working.   <SAME TIER> So strange. You ought to be able to just download a firmware file on your laptop and then upload it to the hub via a web interface, like pretty much every piece of network gear ever. <NEW TIER> This would probably be my next option - why fool around? <SAME TIER> I may ask for a pi for Christmas... <SAME TIER> My main concern right now is that opening/mapping ports will "fix" the problem - though that wouldn't convince me that the problem was my simple consumer hub or missing port mappings. I'm not a server farm and I shouldn't be in the business of accepting novel inbound connections on an array of ports.

Anyhow, based on your comment, I'm probably singing to the choir... <SAME TIER> Yeah... that's not how ST works... <NEW TIER> Can't argue with that logic :) <SAME TIER> I bet with enough poking around you could decipher how they push the firmware and do something similar.  I rather intend to do this, myself, once I get my home firewall in proper order and can start intercepting comms. <NEW TIER> You know, I am cheap and I do love to tinker so home assistant is enticing. I have a dev/systems background so there are no technical barriers whatsoever.

But as they say, everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. Do I really want to be "tinkering" with the thing that controls my house should an upgrade go wrong or a security flaw be revealed the day before a two week vacation? Like my car, something that just works would be good.

All that said, can I assume your experience has been stellar? From your flair, I see you drive a Cadillac (the S6). <SAME TIER> The hubs are connected to the service already.  Otherwise nothing would work.

The way this works around the firewalling is the ST hub simply phones home to the server. <NEW TIER> That is one of the major reasons I chose HomeSeer was that once setup it requires no tinkering and is super reliable (99.99%).  You could try out both HomeSeer and home assistant before you decided on using one or the other.  Yes the S6 is the highest tier of physical controller they have but you can buy the software and load it onto any hardware if you wanted.  My experience has been perfect. <SAME TIER> This gal/guy gets it!

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  1093
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 Robot Vacuum suggestions <SUB> I've been reading threads and researching for the past 3 hours and I'm starting to feel overwhelmed, so I'm hoping this may help. Appreciate any input.

I've been fighting the urge to pull the trigger on a robot vacuum for a few months now. I had impulsively purchased a Roomba 960 on a Black Friday deal, but I returned it before even opening the box, because I had a hard time justifying spending that much money on a vacuum, when I could just do the job myself with the standing Dyson vac I have sitting in my basement. Problem is, both my wife and I are lazy and don't vacuum as often as we should, and we have a dog with medium hair that sheds a ton, so the floors get messy quickly. Mix in a newborn on the way, and I'm starting to think a Robot vac may become a need rather than a luxury.

My house has three floors, each about 800 sq. ft. - upstairs bedrooms with low-pyle carpets, main floor with hardwood but two area rugs, as well as a step down to the family room (\~35% of the total area of this floor), and a basement with a high carpet. The main floor is high priority for cleaning just because of the foot and paw traffic, but I do like the idea of having a vac that can memorize the other two floors if we want to carry it up or down to get some cleaning. I want to make sure we buy something that won't have a problem with the area rugs, and won't run off the ledge into the other room. Google Home automation, or a high-quality app is also-preferred. Mopping is not a need, because we don't wear shoes around the house and wipe our dog's paws when coming inside from the dirt/mud. That being said, having to eliminate our usage of the swiffer would be a nice luxury.

&amp;#x200B;

Ideally, I'd like to stay under $400. After several hours of research, I've been drawn to the following solutions:

&amp;#x200B;

Roborock S50 - I've read a lot of threads of people gushing about their Roborock S50, which is about $450 with coupons right now. I'll admit the fact that it's Chinese and they will try to mine my data is somewhat concerning (I don't mind when Google does it, but i'll be damned if I let a foreign company do it /s). It is also slightly above my budget. The mopping solution is an appealing luxury with the wood floors, but really this comes down to the fact that it sounds like it just gets the job done efficiently on multiple floors and surfaces. They rarely get lost, and can handle multiple surfaces and floors. I also saw the E25, which is within my price range, but don't see a lot written about it.

&amp;#x200B;

Deebot M88/900 - The N79's low price right now is initially what drew me to the Ecovac brand, as well as its reputation for being a good solution for pet hair. The M88 won Consumer reports' best robot vac, and the price is certainly right. As I mentioned above, the mopping solution seems like a luxury, but I don't know if the technology is there yet. the price on these are in the $200's with some of the coupons/discounts going around right now. My concerns here are the performance with multiple floors, as well as multiple surfaces. I had read that these struggle to go from hardwood to carpet, and wanted to see if this is a real concern, or just a sacrifice I would have to make given my price limitations? I also have considered the OZMO 930, as I can get it for about $400 with some current promotions.

&amp;#x200B;

Neato - I didn't look too much into this brand, because people seem to rave mostly about the D7, which is out of my price range. The D-shape gets a good reputation for being able to get edges, but most round robots also have side-sweepers, so I'm not really too concerned about that. I can be persuaded to this if the price is right.

&amp;#x200B;

Roomba - These have to be mentioned, just because they are the most well-known brand, and maybe(?) have the best support/customer service. The 960 seems to meet most of my needs, but is out of my price range, and more people seem to prefer that one.

I'm open to all suggestions, so if i glossed over, or didn't mention at all, an option that I should really consider, please let me know. Thanks again for all help. <SUB> I work at a Roomba and neato repair place and soon to be eco vac repair place aswell, I'd say the neatos clean better but brake easier then the Roomba's and the eco vacs from what I've seen are similar to the roombas in design can't say much about them though <NEW TIER> How about Xiaomi? <NEW TIER> Oh also the shark and one of the eco-vac models are made by the same manufacturer  and the parts are basically interchangeable is what I've heard from one of the internal guys working there  <SAME TIER> Not sure haven't seen them before
DOCUMENT:  3300
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 New Business for Home Automation <SUB> I have little first-hand experience with home automation. I am aware of certain products and I know how to code and I love to tinker so I am going to begin playing with things myself shortly.

During this thought process this got me on to the idea of home automation instalment and customisation as a business (+ home furnishing would compliment this). I have a strong interest in the idea of self employment and am interested to see where this thought process could take me. I understand I have no information to provide you on any specific ideas or developments but I am here to ask people familiar and passionate with the field. My questions are simply:

1) Does home automation feel like a new and emerging trend that will one day be incorporated in to the daily lives of the masses? (my feeling is yes - but I want to make sure its not just a bubble of hobbyists and enthusiasts).

2) As for the products; who manufactures the majority of products (hardware+software) that you would recommend purchasing? Is it through big companies such as Samsung, Google etc.. or more local and smaller companies. Or do you purchase general hardware and tinker the customisation yourself? If you do the customisation yourself how easy is your UI to make quick adjustments.

3) As this is an enthusiasts sub I would guess the majority of you set-up all your own devices and configurations. How aware are you of companies that offer this service at a charge?

4) Where do you recommend I start tinkering? I have a raspberry pi and the open source  automation openHAB

I am sorry if I sound naive, this would be my first time considering starting a business. If there are other important things you believe I should consider immediately please chime in. I just want to get a feel as to whether I am too late to the scene or not and competition is already high. I am really passionate about all things to do with technological advances and would love to pursue a career around it.

Please help me out. Thanks a lot! <SUB> Funny you mention this. I noticed a van driving around my neighborhood (I live in a Seattle suburb) from this company: http://www.bobssmarthome.com

Looks like they deal with Control4 and Creston Pyng. 

DOCUMENT:  3744
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 Question about whole-home WiFi mesh. Looking very hard at Velop...Does Google Wifi or Eeros allow you to port forward or set your own DNS? <SUB> I've got a three story house and a basement. My FiOS ONT is in the basement, so my *base* router would need to be placed there. Right now I have the router Verizon gave me, and an apple time capsule/wifi on the second floor, in bridge mode, but it's not cutting it. I can barely get wifi in my master on the 3rd. I also have a roof deck on the "4th" floor, and coverage is for sure spotty. I can't swap the routers because I need the MOCA connection on the router for on demand and such. My plan is to turn off the router features on the Verizon router, and just use it for the MOCA and connect it to whatever new system I get. So this means that my base station must be in the basement. Which is fine - I've got a 16 port switch feeding hard lines to the rest of my house. So my plan is to feed to other wifi mesh stations, and try to achieve the max coverage.

At first I was leaning towards Eeros. But the price is killing me. In addition to that, the 2nd gen's satellite nodes don't have an ethernet jack whatsoever. I get that they're pushing all mesh since they were the first ones to do it, but I've got hard lines in every room of my house for a reason. So in order to take advantage of that, I'd have to get the Eero Pro system, with 3 base stations. $499 Yeah, thats not moving in price AT ALL this black friday...or at least, not enough to make me pull the trigger.

So then I checked out Orbi. Looks great! But again, oof on the price. By the range tests on CNet, I may be able to get away with two of them. The other benefit is that they are essentially a switch themselves (have 4 ports). But I'd be in the same situation with two routers. My *base* router would be in the basement, and I guess that the base router and the one on the second would provide coverage to the first floor, and then the second floor would provide coverage to the third and my roof deck. Thats asking a lot. I'd rather have a system of 3 if possible. It's basically as expensive as the eero to get a base and two satellites (not the wall plug satellites).

Google Wifi looks great for the price point, except for two issues - and one of them big. Everything these days is moving towards tri-band. It's dual band. The other issue I have is that Google Wifi is having issues with VPN pass-through, which apparently causes issues with the Aruba RAP VPN that my work has provided me. 

The Velop seems to check all of the boxes. It supports backhaul, and also has a pretty decent range and throughput. Not as great as the Orbi, but still - seems better than eeros and google. After a bit of googling on the interface, looks like they just opened up a web interface for the routers this past summer which allows for more advanced configuration. Google wifi and Eeros seem to be app oriented, and google seems to sport the least options for configuration. I, for sure, want to do port forwarding for my HomeAssistant pi, and also set my Pi-Hole to be the DNS server for the router, and it seems like these more advanced features were opened up.

Anyone have any feedback on these systems? Does Google Wifi or Eeros allow you to port forward or set your own DNS? It seems like the official word from Google is that VPN pass-through isn't supported, which is making it my least favorite in the list...

EDIT: Google WiFi is out for me. Apparently it's incompatible with SkyBell HD. Word to the wise. https://support.google.com/wifi/answer/6304954?hl=en

EDIT2: OK - So I grabbed the Velop and have been trying to get it to work for the last 3 days. The internet kept dropping on it, and nodes kept going offline. I spent 2 hours on the phone with tech support, of which, while I was on hold, I perused the Linksys forums. Turns out a LOT of people are having issues with the system, and had to setup multiple times, RMA / replace nodes, etc. I eventually ended up putting my old FiOS router back in front of the Velop, and attempted to only use it as a WiFi in bridge mode. Still kept dropping nodes and connectivity. Level 2 tech support was supposed to do a call back last night, and finally did an hour later than scheduled. They were supposed to call me after 1pm today, still nothing. However, I DID get an RMA email from them without any explanation attached. I'm done. I've wasted far to much of my time on something that is half-baked. I'm returning it, and have an Eero Pro 3-pack being delivered Monday. <SUB> Sure, just throwing it out there, but even without eero plus I really think they’re the way to go for a home. Get it without plus and you’ll be happy. 

We install enterprise class networks for businesses and very extravagant homes and when that’s not viable we revert to eero. I’ll say that after about 20 eero installs for customers so far I’ve never gotten a call for service or complaints with this system. <NEW TIER> So Velop was complete shit. I'm now buying an Eeros Pro 3-pack. There is probably a reason why their price doesn't drop all that much, likely because they know they're 1st-class when it comes to WiFi. :/ <SAME TIER> We'll see how things go on Cyber Monday. I'd LIKE to get the Eeros pro 3-pack, I just can't get past the pricing. I'm seeing a Velop 3-pack for $329 on amazon thats factory refurbished. The eeros doesn't seem to have any refurbished on sale, which probably just means that people are happy with them and don't return them for whatever reason...and for all I know, the velops got returned because people weren't tech savvy and couldn't set them up or placed them in the wrong areas of their house.
If eeros could drop below $400, then I'd probably give it a very hard second look.


TOPIC: 18
KEYWORDS: switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimmer, need, wire, hub
REFERENCE COMMENT: 6230
TEXT: 
 Switch I bought won't work, bulbs the solution? <SUB> So my wife wants to replace a light fixture in our bedroom with a ceiling fan (but it's just a fan, there's no light). We made two bedrooms into one for our master when we moved in in July, so the room is a long rectangle and the other side of the room where our dressers are will be fairly dark if there's no light down there. 

Basically I had planned on putting a lamp on one of the dressers with a smart bulb in it and replacing the switch near the door (that controls the light fixture on the one side) with a smart switch. Plan being that when you hit the switch and turn on the ceiling light on the one side, it'd turn on the bulb on the other side of the room that's in the lamp. 

Went to replace the switch for the light fixture today with one of the GE z-wave switches but my house is older (1962) and apparently the switches need an additional wire that I don't have in order to operate correctly. 

My question is this: could I install one smart bulb in the light fixture and then one in the lamp across the room. My thought being that when the smart bulb in the fixture is reading as on it will trigger the bulb in the lamp across the room to turn on. Will this work or an I missing something?

Also, are there any smart switches that will work in older house that don't have line, load, neutral, and ground wires (I just have 3 connected to my switches)? 

Edit: I'm using a smartthings hub in case that makes a difference. <SUB> You can use the Lutron light system as that system does not require a neutral wire. <NEW TIER> Would I have to get a separate hub just for those or will they work with the smartthings hub I already have? 

Edit: one of the other comments talks about those but says I'll need a bridge. <NEW TIER> You need the Lutron hub as well. <NEW TIER> Gotcha. Any thoughts on my idea of using two smart bulbs? The fixture on the switch has 3 bulbs so my thought is to replace one with a smart bulb and then put another in the lamp across the room. When it sees that the bulb in the fixture is on it'd turn on the bulb in the lamp. Am I missing something in that thinking? <NEW TIER> Lutron also makes lamp dimmers that you can also use as well.  So, you don't need to commit to just a smart bulb in this case.  

For the fixture, use either smart bulb or the Lutron  switch, but not both.  It's going to get confusing.  Smart bulb needs constant power to be controlled. Whether you use a smart bulb, or the light switch to trigger the lamp, the result will be the same.
 <NEW TIER> Well I plan on having the lamp "on" at all times so the single smart bulb can be controlled by light fixture. I basically want to effectively "link" them so when I turn the fixture on the lamp turns on. I guess a question is if there's a way where if I have one smart bulb in the fixture and it reads as being "on" (if I leave it being controlled by a regular switch) it will trigger a smart bulb in the lamp to turn on. <NEW TIER> This should be doable in Smartthings. I don't use a smartthings hub, so I'm not familiar with everything it can do. The reason I say it should be doable in smartthings is because I use Apple Homekit as my hub and I do this all the time.  I trigger one light to come on, if another one comes on.  It's fairly trivial rule to write.  So, I'm assuming smartthings should have similar capabilities.  Smartbulbs don't like power to be turned off from them, so the light switch needs to be on all the time.
 <SAME TIER> I don't think it works that way. I'm brainstorming for what you can do...what kind of bulbs do you need to use? Are they standard? <NEW TIER> &gt; what kind of bulbs do you need to use? Are they standard?

The type of bulbs in the light fixture (not the lamp where I plan on using a smart bulb)? I have LED bulbs in there currently, and they are just the regular ol' size light bulbs, not the little skinny ones or real big or anything like that (if that's what you're asking).

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  70
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 GE z wave on/off switch question <SUB> I'm looking to add the switch to my smart things set up and pair the switch to hue bulbs in different parts of the same room. Currently the dumb switch I'm hoping to replace controls the power (thru internal wiring to a ceiling lamp) of a dumb bulb. I want to install the z wave switch in its place and a hue color bulb in the dumb bulb's place. My goal is to have the switch control that new hue bulb and another one across the room connected to an "always on" outlet. I want to be able to have the ability to control the lights through an app and with the switch interchangeably. 

Will physically flipping the GE switch cut the power to that ceiling light (hue bulb)? Or can I program it to leave the power on to the ceiling light and only send the signal through smartthings to the hue bulb to shut off? 

I would really appreciate any help. Thanks!

This is the switch:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0035YRCR2/ <SUB> I've got a bunch of those switches, and no, they can't directly do what you want.  The only configuration on the switches is to reverse the orientation of the switch and to change how the LED on the switch operates.

That said, it might be possible to do what you want anyway.  If you were to not connect the load wire to the switch and just connect hot, neutral, and ground, the switch might still send a Z-wave signal.  You'd need to tie the load wire to a hot wire so the bulb would still get power. <NEW TIER> Thanks for the input. I was hoping to avoid that scenario, but I guess it may be my only option. 
DOCUMENT:  139
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 GE Z-wave 3 way wiring help <SUB> I am working to replace a 3 way dumb dimmer switch with GE z-Wave switch and an add-on switch for the recessed lighting in my kitchen. When I tore into the two switch boxes to get started I got kind of confused by how the circuit was wired. The photos show both the dimmer switch and the toggle switch. The Line power comes into the toggle switch. Then the travel goes up across the ceiling to power the lights. The traveler is the only connection into the dimmer switch on the other wall. The toggle switch has the black wires tied together and the ground wires tied together. It is using the Whites for the terminals on the toggle. 

https://imgur.com/a/fXlAX

I had expected the blacks to be on the toggle terminals and the whites tied together. Then I would have just gone ahead and wired it up. The confusion I have is because the toggle is using the white wires instead of the black.

How would I replace the dimmer with a Z-Wave dimmer and the toggle switch with the add-on switch ?  <SUB> This is a back fed three way. Switches only break the hot wire and turn it on or off depending on the switches position. I’m going to guess that the line and neutral you need is in the light and you are backfed. Now you could get lucky and only side of the switch is backfed but I would need to see inside the 3 gang and the light to verify it  <NEW TIER> The link has the pics inside the 3 gag. The only connection is the traveler 3 wire to the dimmer itself.
DOCUMENT:  1677
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 Question about combining switches and bulbs for same lights <SUB> I like the idea of color changing smart bulbs for certain applications, such as floods for my front porch (seasonal colors) or dimmed red light for night vision when walking in my hallway (don't really need to turn on bright white lights if someone gets up to go to the bathroom). Clearly all of this can be accomplished through smart bulbs and wiring my current switches to be always on. However, there are times when a physical switch is preferable, like when family comes over, guests stay with us, or someone needs to flip a switch on in an emergency. I have a few 3 way switches, so I was looking at the Caseta Wireless Smart Lighting Dimmer Switch and Remote Kit and was wondering if I could combine a smart switch and a smart bulb for the same light. Is it possible that instead of the switch itself killing the power to the bulb, it just tells the bulb to turn off? Are there better 3-way switches for this? I've tried searching, but most of what I have found is "switches vs bulbs" and not "switches working with bulbs".

I currently am running Alexa and will be building a RPi3 w/HA soon. Thanks! <SUB> What bulbs are you using? If Hue, you could get a Hue dimmer switch and use that instead. <NEW TIER> No bulbs yet, just getting started out. I like the idea of the remote/hue bulb combo. I was looking at the Caseta switches originally so I could use them with dumb bulbs too and keep it pretty uniform through the house.

In short, there is no way to combine smart switches and bulbs for the same light and to do so would just cost more. <NEW TIER> I recommend doing what the person below has said, but note that you can do it with a Hue dimmer switch. 

Hardwire the switch on (instead of a switch completing the circuit or breaking it, wrap the wires together and put a wire nut over it). Then it permanently has power.  Get rid of the now useless electrical box and put a Hue Dimmer switch in its place. Its plate mounts to the wall and the remote has a strong magnet to stay there. It’ll function like a switch with more options, allowing you to control the bulb directly or use the switch.  <NEW TIER> Thanks. I wonder if I can inset the remotes into a gang box a bit so it looks like real switches and not be bumped out. I'm also not a fan of battery powered switches, I wish the power for them would come from the wiring. <SAME TIER> I was Leary if hardwiring my switch’s, so I bought this to put over the light switch.  

Mitzvah Family Magnetic Switch &amp; Outlet Cover for Flat Modern Switches https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002WQ2UBM/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_B9mzAbKN9R41E

I then used command strips to attach the hue dimmer to the cover.  Looks better then I expected.  And if the shit ever hits the fan it it a 1 second process to get to the dumb switch.


TOPIC: 9
KEYWORDS: sensor, house, system, thermostat, nest, go, motion, need, doorbell, room
REFERENCE COMMENT: 7020
TEXT: 
 HVAC guy said Nest Thermostats are bad for Furnaces and that they “fry the motherboards” and overwork most systems . <SUB> Had a HVAC guy come out and do a free “home health report” check on our home, it’s our first winter in the house and had HVAC guy come check our system. 

He noticed I had a Nest and politely shook his head - he went on a mini-rant telling me how Nest was founded and built by “Techies” and not people who fully understand how HVAC systems actually work.

He said he never recommends them and that their company is REGULARLY replacing systems that have failed or prematurely broken down due to the Nest overworking the computing systems/motherboards built in to most HVAC units - even brand new models. 

He shared a story of a job he completely where they installed a top of the line unit in a brand new house and within a month they had to go back and replace  the entire “guts” of the system because the Nest Thermostat the homeowners insisted on keeping and because they were using the Nest along with it - the replacement was NOT covered by warranty.

Is this guy full of it? 

tl;dr HVAC guy says Nest Thermostats are made by “techies” and break down HVAC units prematurely. 

Edit: He was not a “grumpy old school” HVAC guy... probably late 20s early 30s. <SUB> HVAC systems go out. When it happens, there's no way to say why, aside from which part died. There's no diagnostic code for "Nest thermostat overworked computing system". (And, obviously, it's just as easily the issue of the computing system - rather than throwing an error, *don't allow it*.)

Any rate, when an HVAC system goes out, the tendency for a technician is to chalk it up to the gods. It's not like they perform root cause analysis, or even care (and nor should they). Just replace the faulty part, and move on. In other words, if hypothetically a thermostat could cause an issue, no one has any reason to assume that's what the issue was.

However, you add WiFi or god forbid "smart" on a product, and now all of a sudden it's always going to be in the back of their mind that "maybe that's why".

As for the "REGULARLY replacing systems", assuming it's not just confirmation bias (which is a HUGE assumption),  Nest, etc., are very common, and are new. Even if actually tracking the numbers showed Nests have a disproportionate number of failures, it isn't how statistics work, because there's an ever increasing number of Nests (on old HVAC systems), so you'd have to adjust for the *increasing* market share rather than as a relatively static number or "point in time".

More to the point, there's a plausible reason why it could be that a disproportionate number of Nests might have failures. When someone has a problem with their AC not working well enough (or their electric rates rise because the AC is struggling), replacing the thermostat might be some peoples' first step. Then the AC unit fails entirely, and Nest gets the blame despite being a *symptom* of the real problem. It may more common *because* their AC is about to fail.

Regardless, at the end of the day, without a reason for how a thermostat *could* cause any failure (specifically more so than a Honeywell slapping WiFi on top of their old model and calling it "smart"), we'd be equally justified in saying houses with smart electric meters at the pole have AC's that often fail. 

edit: And once a fault has occurred, the HVAC technician is likely to say "It must have been cuz that fancy thermostat you got" and based on such the "expert advice", the homeowner replaces the smart thermostat with a cheap Honeywell piece of crap, and... The HVAC is likely to last another 10 years without issue, but if it fails again, it clearly couldn't possibly have been because of the Honeywell! Unless the owner did *not* replace the thermostat, in which case, clearly it must be that Nest that causes TWO failures, which just proves how bad they are! <NEW TIER> That's an awesome point on how increasing market share contributes to the statistics.  

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  2417
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 HVAC guy said Nest Thermostats are bad for Furnaces and that they “fry the motherboards” and overwork most systems . <SUB> Had a HVAC guy come out and do a free “home health report” check on our home, it’s our first winter in the house and had HVAC guy come check our system. 

He noticed I had a Nest and politely shook his head - he went on a mini-rant telling me how Nest was founded and built by “Techies” and not people who fully understand how HVAC systems actually work.

He said he never recommends them and that their company is REGULARLY replacing systems that have failed or prematurely broken down due to the Nest overworking the computing systems/motherboards built in to most HVAC units - even brand new models. 

He shared a story of a job he completely where they installed a top of the line unit in a brand new house and within a month they had to go back and replace  the entire “guts” of the system because the Nest Thermostat the homeowners insisted on keeping and because they were using the Nest along with it - the replacement was NOT covered by warranty.

Is this guy full of it? 

tl;dr HVAC guy says Nest Thermostats are made by “techies” and break down HVAC units prematurely. 

Edit: He was not a “grumpy old school” HVAC guy... probably late 20s early 30s. <SUB> those damn techies who don't understand the computing systems/motherboards built in to most HVAC units.  lmao <NEW TIER> They do understand it. They understand it enough to exploit it, and even explain that what they’re doing to exploit it might not actually work very well. 

https://nest.com/support/article/When-Nest-needs-a-common-C-wire#wire-may-thermostat
DOCUMENT:  6817
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 HVAC guy said Nest Thermostats are bad for Furnaces and that they “fry the motherboards” and overwork most systems . <SUB> Had a HVAC guy come out and do a free “home health report” check on our home, it’s our first winter in the house and had HVAC guy come check our system. 

He noticed I had a Nest and politely shook his head - he went on a mini-rant telling me how Nest was founded and built by “Techies” and not people who fully understand how HVAC systems actually work.

He said he never recommends them and that their company is REGULARLY replacing systems that have failed or prematurely broken down due to the Nest overworking the computing systems/motherboards built in to most HVAC units - even brand new models. 

He shared a story of a job he completely where they installed a top of the line unit in a brand new house and within a month they had to go back and replace  the entire “guts” of the system because the Nest Thermostat the homeowners insisted on keeping and because they were using the Nest along with it - the replacement was NOT covered by warranty.

Is this guy full of it? 

tl;dr HVAC guy says Nest Thermostats are made by “techies” and break down HVAC units prematurely. 

Edit: He was not a “grumpy old school” HVAC guy... probably late 20s early 30s. <SUB> Mine said the same thing. We had an ecobee4 installed that’s been good so far. 
DOCUMENT:  7057
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 HVAC guy said Nest Thermostats are bad for Furnaces and that they “fry the motherboards” and overwork most systems . <SUB> Had a HVAC guy come out and do a free “home health report” check on our home, it’s our first winter in the house and had HVAC guy come check our system. 

He noticed I had a Nest and politely shook his head - he went on a mini-rant telling me how Nest was founded and built by “Techies” and not people who fully understand how HVAC systems actually work.

He said he never recommends them and that their company is REGULARLY replacing systems that have failed or prematurely broken down due to the Nest overworking the computing systems/motherboards built in to most HVAC units - even brand new models. 

He shared a story of a job he completely where they installed a top of the line unit in a brand new house and within a month they had to go back and replace  the entire “guts” of the system because the Nest Thermostat the homeowners insisted on keeping and because they were using the Nest along with it - the replacement was NOT covered by warranty.

Is this guy full of it? 

tl;dr HVAC guy says Nest Thermostats are made by “techies” and break down HVAC units prematurely. 

Edit: He was not a “grumpy old school” HVAC guy... probably late 20s early 30s. <SUB> UKer here. I was thinking of adding a Nest thermostat to my setup in the medium term. Honeywell support say "The C wired is only present in the US models and it is used for centralized air applications. The UK modes do not have this wire."

Does this mean I could safely get a Nest without screwing up my boiler? Should I get the Honeywell instead? The guy who just replaced my (non-smart) thermostat loved them, he couldn't say enough nice things about them.


TOPIC: 7
KEYWORDS: turn, google, tv, control, alexa, app, light, device, set, google home
REFERENCE COMMENT: 4145
TEXT: 
 Walmart is offering the $59.99 harmony hub deal with free 2 day shipping or local pickup. <SUB> Just ordered two myself, this looks like the same deal amazon always has that sells out. 

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Logitech-Harmony-Smart-Remote-Control/34969761 <SUB> Man, I love my harmony for integrating with Alexa, but to hate "activities".. i must be doing something wrong. <NEW TIER> Can you explain why you hate activities? Perhaps then we can figure out if you are doing something wrong. <SAME TIER> No, they way they handle things with activities is fucking dumb. It is confusing and unintuitive. <NEW TIER> Like others have said in the thread. I enjoy them in general. The harmony hub for me.just works as an interface between Alexa and my equipment. Where I dislike it is mainly the remote. In example I ask Alexa to turn the TV on, she runs that activity on harmony, turns my TV, sets the input, my.stereo on sets that input,Comcast box on, all is fine.  Now I wanna watch Netflix which on my TV's app, I need to change the input to tv for the audio source and set remote to use the TV functions. Now Im guessing the best way to do that is make an activity that switches it rather than does power cycles but it's just easier with a remote. Eventually going between inputs gets everything out of whack. There's no option on the remote to just do things simply.  <SAME TIER> If a device gets turned off without harmony or falls asleep while the activity is running then it gets into this weird out of sync state where turning off the activity turns the device on, then turning on the activity turns the device off until it gets corrected.

I've also run into issues where Alexa won't let me do something while an activity is or isn't running depending on the situation. <SAME TIER> Enlighten me here. I think it's fantastic. Here's why.

Before: Remote for TV, Stereo, Apple TV, Cable Box, BD Player. Explain to wife how you need to set the input on the stereo so that the picture ends up on the TV, touch 3 remotes to get it all done.

After: "Hear honey, push the button that says 'Watch TV', and everything gets set perfectly without you needing to think about it. Want to change to Apple TV? Hit the button for that activity and it's done. Want to do those things with an Alexa device? "Alexa, turn on Apple TV" and whammo, it's done.

This is absolutely HUGE with parents and grandparents. For example, my wife's grandmother didn't watch one of their TVs for about a year because she couldn't make heads or tails out of the remotes. We bought her one of these when it was on sale at Amazon, and she loves it.

I'm really not getting where the confusion or lack of intuitiveness is here. <SAME TIER> Thats why i use the harmony server. https://github.com/bwssytems/restful-harmony
Wtih this, i can access all buttons on all my remotes, so i dont use activities. I use this either with ha-bridge from the same programmers (bwssytems) or directly from Home Assistant (JSON API). It seems complicated, but it works. When I say "Alexa, turn on TV", she ask my ha-bridge (emulated hue), the emulated hue talks to Home Assistant, Home Assistant talks to harmony-bridge, the harmony-bridge talks to the real harmony hub and "presses" button (turn on tv, satellite receiver, audio receiver). <NEW TIER> You don’t create activities like macros. Harmony knows what’s running and what isn’t running, and will only power on/off devices as necessary to get to the desired activity.

Your remote is tied to the current activity. Whether you started it with Alexa or with the remote, your hub knows what activity is running.

If Devices are getting powered off that shouldn’t, you need to update your Harmony config to leave the device powered on, even when not in use.

What is hard about clicking one button on the remote for the “Netflix” activity? It sounds like your activity configuration is incorrect. <SAME TIER> Side note: If you find a single device turns off and you only have a power toggle button you can just bind the device power button to one of the buttons on the remote for that activity. That directly exposes the power command so you can quickly 'fix' the out-of-sync issue. <SAME TIER> So the toggle thing is annoying I guess, but that's becasue your device is sub-par. It only has a power toggle command apparently. Better IR command sets have a power-on and a power-off. I would check though, it could be that your device supports both and for some reason your profile is using the power toggle command instead of the power on/off commands.

The Harmony &lt;-&gt; Alexa interactions are actually my biggest gripe TBH. Second biggest is that Sony are a bunch of morons and won't let anything other than a Dualshock 4 turn the PS4 on so my Harmony can't really work with the PS4 without the DS4 or some CEC trickery. It sucks so bad I bought an Xbox (true story). <SAME TIER> Yeah, I also don't understand the dislike or confusion. I have a few of my own annoyances with activities, but that's mostly due to how activities show up in Alexa. Overall I love my Harmony though. <SAME TIER> /u/unbornx summed it up decently.

https://www.reddit.com/r/homeautomation/comments/86c34g/walmart_is_offering_the_5999_harmony_hub_deal/dw458u2/

What you are describing is how a normal universal remote functions without the activities bullshit. There is no reason I can't have that single button turn all that stuff on without it being tied to an "activity" that has a running or not running state. The remote should just send commands, not have these weird activity states that prohibit shit from happening depending on what the state is. <SAME TIER> I hate activities as well. It really limits what the harmony can do. I would love to implement what you have here where Alexa can essentially "push" any button on my Harmony remote. Problem is, I have no idea what I am looking at here. What would I need to implement this? A rasberrypi with Home Assistant? Then what? <SAME TIER> Is this somehow different from just doing it within Home Assistant using the [remote.send_command](https://home-assistant.io/components/remote.harmony/#service-remotesend_command) service directly rather than routing through restful-harmony first? <SAME TIER> Might have to check that out.

The activities seems like logitechs way of trying to simplify the setup of this thing which might work for simple on/off but when I want to do more it just becomes confusing and restrictive. <NEW TIER> You can access every individual remote like normal. If I activate my “Watch TV” activity, but need to access a button not mapped to that activity, I can just go to “Devices” in the app.

What is unintuitive about hitting one button to start all the devices and set them to the correct inputs for a given activity? <SAME TIER> I've never seen a universal remote that behaves that way you're describing without an absurd amount of work, creating custom macros that's an error-prone process. It's precisely why most folks give up on programming macros on universal remotes, and are relegated to the same process as before, but with a single remote instead of multiple. Now, your activity setup looks like: "TV button, power, stereo button, power, cable box button, power, stereo button, set input, cable box button, set channel" Want to change the volume? Oops, you'll need to hit the stereo button.

What a massive waste of time and effort. 

And frankly, /u/unbornx's use case is a silly, contrived one. Once you've setup your Harmony, you don't keep all the other remotes hanging around, taking up space on the table. You put them away. So no, you wouldn't turn off the TV with the TV's remote. You'd turn the thing off with the off button on the Harmony. <SAME TIER> Yes that would be the "correcting" it that I talked about. <SAME TIER> A 'normal universal remote' handles multiple timed commands in sequence ? <SAME TIER> &gt; but that's becasue your device is sub-par.

Lol fuck you. A normal ass universal remote doesn't have the problem. <SAME TIER> yeah, what was dumb is lets say if i was turning on activity "tv on" on harmony. Receiver, audio and tv turned on.
If i turn off tv with the actual remote, tv turned off (leaving receiver and audio on, that ok, because i didnt use the activity). Later in the day, if i ask harmony "tv on", because the states is still "on", it would not turn tv on. routine/activities on harmony are too much user-firendly and does not work well for us, more techie. Those activities always work on, off, but it needs to be off to go on...  <SAME TIER> thats how i started, a raspberry pi with home assistant, restful-harmony and ha-bridge. all this with alexa work wonderfully and i have full control. (since alexa discovers ha-bridge like if it was a real philips hue).  <SAME TIER> good question, i always thought that i had to do it this way. i think that there is no way of accessing "buttons" directcly on harmony hub. thats why i access restful-harmony and this restuful knows a way of talking to the real hub. i'll test this <NEW TIER> The unintuitive part is how the activity has a running or not running state that prohibits certain things. <SAME TIER> Why would you turn the tv off with the individual remote and keep your receiver and audio on?

The point is to have Harmony replace everything.

If you wanted to turn the TV off but keep receiver / music on, create a “Listen to Music” activity. You still hit one button on the Harmony remote.

If Harmony ever gets desynced from the actual state of your devices, just hit the ? button in the app. In my many years of using various Harmony remotes, that almost never happens. <SAME TIER> Listen, I'm not saying the harmony hubs doesn't do more than standard universal remotes. I'm saying it doesn't need the stupid actions in order to do it.

And I keep the other remotes around because my wife and I both want our own on our nightstands. <SAME TIER> One button can do more than one thing, yes. But that isn't the point. You don't need to track the state of an "activity" to do that in the first place. I don't have a problem with the activities themselves I suppose, I have a problem with how they are treated as "running" or "not running". I can't just have a button turn on a thing. I have to have an activity running for that button to be able to do that thing. I get that it allows you to have a button do more than one thing based on which activity is running, but it also forces me to turn one activity off before I turn another on. I can't just switch between activities on the fly.

These activities serve the same purpose that the "TV", "Receiver", "Satellite" etc buttons do on a normal universal remote where you put the remote into "TV mode" and the buttons will perform the actions they are programmed to while in TV mode, then you press "Satellite" and it goes into "Satellite Mode" and they perform whatever actions they are supposed to for that. The difference is I don't have to track the states of these modes on a normal universal remote. <SAME TIER> I find that odd because if I use the Harmony remote to start an activity again it will go through the full set of activation commands again. I actually have to do it sometime because my TV gets a wild hair up it's ass and changes to the tuner randomly during activity startup. I hate smart TVs. <SAME TIER> Haha. No offence was meant. Just an objective statement of fact. ;)

The Harmony Hub isn't a simple universal remote. It's an advanced remote for automating multiple steps when using your media devices. Technically a universal remote suffers from the same issue, but it's stateless so it actually doesn't impact you. Really, in this specific case, the problem is the TV manufacturer (or whatever device) was cheap and didn't want to include separate On/Off buttons or commands. Again, you may find your device actually supports both a power toggle command and power on/off commands. Post the device model and we can check the IR command set it supports. <SAME TIER> Yeah it works best if you put away all the other remotes, and program the buttons on the harmony remote if you need them.
 <SAME TIER> do I need to buy anything else or do I just need to install HA onto my pi? I have a PI as a my doorbell (simple node server used as a soundboard). It's not doing much, so it'd be nice to use that same pi for this <NEW TIER> Clicking TV on a normal universal remote maps all the buttons on the remote to be the TV buttons. It does not set the TV / audio equipment to all of the appropriate inputs.

How would Harmony tune everything to the appropriate settings if it didn’t know the state of the device?

You are arguing that Harmony should act like a normal universal remote. The whole point is that it DOESN’T because it automates switching device control based on activity. <SAME TIER> yeah, i understand, you have a point there. I forgot to mention, my harmony hub doesn't come with a remote. So changing channels and volume, i need the remotes. Friends, guests, old parents doesnt always want to say "alexa blabalbal". so thats why "sometimes" we use original remotes. this breaks harmony activities. i forgot to mention this too, before, we needed to say "alexa, ask harmony to turn on tv". i didn't find this fluid. the ha-bridge, restful-harmony made "alexa turn on tv" more easy and conveniant. I think that now harmony is built in amazon echo, so i dont have to say "alexa, ask...". I'll have to try.. <SAME TIER> What things are prohibited? Give an example.

The only way the running vs not running state would ever be an issue is if you manually power on/off a device without using Harmony. However, you should never be doing that. If, for whatever reason, the “state” of the device gets off, you just hit the ? button in the app and be done with it.

Most devices nowadays don’t use a “toggle” state function anyway...there are separate commands for power on/power off.

I have an activity for Watch TV that powers on devices that are required for that activity. If I switch to another activity, I can set it up to either power down unused devices or leave them running.


Just put away the other remotes. Why would you have them out? <SAME TIER> You’ve completely missed the boat. One of the main drivers behind the product IS activities. Without them, it’s of little more utility than a $10 universal remote from Walmart. Without activities, the only advantages it has over the $10 product is the ability to program it by USB, and its ability to talk to stuff over WLAN.

TV in the bedroom? Never understood the attraction.  <SAME TIER> &gt; It's an advanced remote for automating multiple steps when using your media devices.

Translation: They over-engineered it in an attempt to make it user friendly and ended up fucking it up.

Explain to me how the activites are better than just simply sending the commands I tell it to. <NEW TIER> Dude can you please keep this in a single thread. I'm not going to argue with you in three different locations about the same thing. <SAME TIER> Yeah, Harmony without a remote would be very frustrating and your devices are bound to get out of sync with their intended state.

I would personally hop on this Walmart deal and sell the hub that comes with it.

The companion remote is great quality, and I prefer to the more expensive remotes. If I want advanced touchscreen capability, I can use the app. Otherwise, 99.99999% of daily functionality is done via voice or the companion remote. <SAME TIER> &gt; What things are prohibited? Give an example.

I use a home theater PC. Activity is off but I want to close whatever program is running on the HTPC. I can't do that unless the activity is running.

Also Alexa frequently just refuses to do things because "that activity is not currently running."

&gt; Just put away the other remotes. Why would you have them out?

That would be fine if I didn't have to pay a bazillion dollars for one of their fancy remotes since they won't let me pair more than one of the remotes that comes with the hub. But my wife and I like having a remote on each nightstand. <SAME TIER> Explain to me how the activities can't serve their function without having a monitored state. <SAME TIER> It let's you do way more that control one device at a time? I mean, you can have a button that triggers a bunch of stuff, including dining lights and closing blinds, then customizes the button layout for what ever you are doing. And you can assist that to your personal preference.

Anyway, if you don't like it don't use it. It's a cool device but it's not flawless and it's not for everyone. <NEW TIER> Why are you trying to close what is running without the HTPC activity running?

Your beef is really with the Alexa integration, only allowing you to start / stop activities via voice. Device-level functionality can be controlled via the Remote or App, even if an activity is not running via the “Devices” menu. You can even map custom buttons to the remote to do exactly what you want.

Why are you controlling power from the non-Harmony remote, even if each of you have a remote?

Your use seems to be very edge-case. Instead of stating that Harmony may not work for your individual situation (or you have not configured it to), you try to make it seem like the idea of “Activities” is some super unintuitive idea that no one likes.

The idea of activities is that the user doesn’t want to think about manual, individual device control (power on, change input, etc.) The user cares about what they want to accomplish (Watch TV, Play Xbox, Listen to Music, etc.)

I say “Watch TV” and all of my devices are turned on, they are set to the appropriate inputs, my lights dim appropriately, and my companion remote has all appropriate buttons mapped. How is that unintuitive?


 <SAME TIER> It’s pretty clear you don’t like the product. If you don’t like it and want to be obtuse, specifically working to break a simple and obvious paradigm, well, I guess that’s your prerogative.

The bottom line is that people don’t sit down in front of remote controls - they sit down in front of the things they want to use. Mainly that’s TVs and associated bits that feed them content to display. The goal is to get the myriad of remotes, keystrokes, and macros out of the way, not merely to consolidate remote controls.

Honestly, your use case for the bedroom is kind of ridiculous. If your goal is to have 2 remotes in the same room, just buy an additional remote of the same type as what came with your stuff. Using the Harmony the way you describe is intentionally breaking the thing.

The bottom line is you’re vastly in the minority here. The product is simple and intuitive. So simple and intuitive that my wife's 90 year old grandmother can use it successfully, and even loves it. <SAME TIER> How does that require an activity with a monitored state?

You seem to be misunderstanding. I like the cool things the harmony hubs can do. I hate the dumbass activities and their on or off states. None of the things you are describing require them. <NEW TIER> The bottom line with is you still haven't explained to me how activities can't serve their function without an monitored state.

I don't like harmony hubs but I have and use 2 of them? <NEW TIER> As obvious as it should be, I'll break it down for you.

Lots of devices, especially TVs, were engineered badly, and do things like use a "PowerToggle" IR code, rather than codes for "PowerOn" and "PowerOff". They also do things like use a single "NextInput" code vs having a code for each individual input. I don't like TVs like that, but the reality is lots of them do exist, and it's not always from crappy manufacturers. There are similar difficulties with DVD/BD players and cable boxes of various makes, though for the most part only with the power on/off functions.

Without knowing what state the equipment is in, with your dopey use case of "let me alter the state of the equipment in a way that the Harmony knows nothing about" creates a bunch of problems. 

Here's a problem situation for you. You've got a TV that does the round-robin style of input selection, and you've been watching TV. You decide you want to flip inputs to your Apple TV or Roku, so in your mind, you grab the TV's remote, change the input to watch your streaming device, finish up and then you switch off using (again) the TV's remote. It's now tomorrow, and your wife wants to watch some CNN while she's getting dressed. Remember, we don't have any notion of state here, so the Harmony has absolutely no way to know which input your TV is set to. So, she hits the "Watch TV" button, and the input is wrong, because the remote has no frame of reference as to where it should have been in the first place. Even with state, because of your insistence on intentionally breaking the product paradigm, it's also broken. If you would have used the Harmony to change activities last night and turned the system off using the Harmony last night, your wife would not currently be yelling at you about this @#$%%^ing remote you're making her use, because it never works right. If you'd used the Harmony correctly, ***because of its knowledge of the state of the equipment***, it would know that the TV is currently on say, HDMI 2, and it needs to be on HDMI 1, so that means sending the "NextInput" code X times to end up set correctly.

&gt; I don't like harmony hubs but I have and use 2 of them?

Clearly you don't, since you're obviously mad that they haven't implemented your poorly conceived use case. <NEW TIER> Nothing you are describing requires running states.

You wanna talk inputs, look at /u/kaizokudave's example.

https://www.reddit.com/r/homeautomation/comments/86c34g/walmart_is_offering_the_5999_harmony_hub_deal/dw5gv72/ <NEW TIER> &gt; Nothing you are describing requires running states.

BS.

You're clearly not an idiot, so I can only think you're either being intentionally obtuse, or you're so far down some ill-conceived rabbit hole that you can't see the obvious.

I'll spell it out completely for you using an example from the remote I set up at my in-laws the other weekend. They've got a TV in the "guest area" of the house, which usually means grandkids.  I forget the brand, but the TV has 3 HDMI inputs, a composite input, and an antenna input.  It's one of those TVs like I mentioned that doesn't offer IR codes to directly access any of those inputs - you must round-robin through the list.  So, it looks like this:


Index | Input Name
---|---
1| Antenna
2| Composite
3| HDMI1
4| HDMI2
5| HDMI3

They have a cable box on HDMI1, and a Wii U connected to HDMI2. There are 2 activities - Watch TV, Play Wii. Simple, right? Without state tracking and operating the way you want to, it's completely broken. Why? Say kids were playing Wii, then later watch TV, and then turn everything off. Check it out:

# Using the Harmony correctly (with state)

1. Hit the Play Wii button, TV comes on, cycles to HDMI2, good times, we're gaming. Game's over, let's put on TV.
2. Hit the Watch TV button. Remote flips on the cable box, and sends the "Next Input" signal to the TV 4 times to cycle to HDMI1. Bang, we're watching reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond. All done? Hit the Off button on the Harmony, everything turns off.
3. Next day, I want to play a game again, so I hit the Play Wii button. TV pops on, ***because Harmony knows the state of the TV*** it sends Next Input once. Game on again.

# Using the Harmony wrongly (your use case, no state)

1. Hit the Play Wii button, TV comes on, but because there is ***no known state***, the remote has no idea what input the TV is currently set to, and thus has no idea how many times to send "Next Input". **Problem**: now we need to use the Harmony's Help feature to help sort out the settings. Done playing, let's watch TV.
2. Per your desires, grab the TV remote and hit the input button 4 times to change to HDMI1. Watch your reruns of Everybody Loves Raymond. Power off the TV with something other than the Harmony, because after all, you're all about doing that for some reason.
3. Next day, it's game time again, so I hit the Play Wii button. TV comes on, but ***because Harmony has no idea what state the TV is in***, it has no idea how many times to send Next Input. **Problem**: You're back to using the help function to resolve it. Again.

I also disagree with /u/kaizokudave's assessment. Watching cable 
and want to flip to Apple TV, you just hit the Watch Apple TV button, or yell at Alexa - "Alexa, turn on Apple TV", and the Harmony changes activities just as if you hit the button on the remote. Quoting /u/kaizokudave:
&gt; There's no option on the remote to just do things simply.

But there is. You just hit the button for the activity you want to change to, and the Harmony takes care of the rest. It's the poster child of simplicity. <NEW TIER> A basic universal remote can handle that with a simple "switch inputs" button. Monitoring states is not needed and often times just complicates things like in /u/kaizokudave's example.

As for /u/kaikokudave's example and your rebuttal...

In reality that isn't how it works.

That second activity can turn of the TV, sound bar, etc., depending on the devices. So he ends up having to turn off the currently running activity and then turning on the next one in order to seamlessly switch. <NEW TIER> So, explain, in detail please, how the basic universal remote is supposed to know how many times to send the Next Input code? **That right there is precisely why state is needed.** Guess what - you can't explain that, because now you're depending on the human to know how many times to change the input. You've now completely defeated the purpose of automating the operation of your entertainment gear.

&gt; That second activity can turn of the TV, sound bar, etc., depending on the devices. So he ends up having to turn off the currently running activity and then turning on the next one in order to seamlessly switch.

I've been using the products since before Logitech bought the company (it was called Intrigue Technologies at the time). What you're saying has *never* been how the thing has worked. It has always sent the IR codes needed to change from the prior state to the newly desired state, no more, no less. Things only get turned off when switching activities if you've told the remote you're not using that thing in the activity you're switching to, which is just common sense. If things are getting turned off when they shouldn't be, you've done something terribly wrong in setting up your Harmony, in which case the blame lies with the person that configured it. <NEW TIER> &gt; So, explain, in detail please, how the basic universal remote is supposed to know how many times to send the Next Input code? That right there is precisely why state is needed. Guess what - you can't explain that, because now you're depending on the human to know how many times to change the input.

Right, it isn't necessary for the device to do it. A human can adjust to the current situation while the device can't. I'm glad you're finally getting this.

&gt; What you're saying has never been how the thing has worked.

On your specific devices. <NEW TIER> What’s the point of home automation if you’re going to take the automated but out of the picture by actively sabotaging it??

My point stands. Despite buying the thing you dislike it, because it doesn’t work the completely backwards and dopey way you wish it would, and would be better off buying a $10 universal remote.
 <NEW TIER> &gt; What’s the point of home automation if you’re going to take the automated but out of the picture by actively sabotaging it??

There is a lot more to the automation this thing provides than auto selecting the input on the TV...

&gt; My point stands. Despite buying the thing you dislike it, because it doesn’t work the completely backwards and dopey way you wish it would, and would be better off buying a $10 universal remote.

Lol dude, I like the harmony. I suggested it to my brother yesterday. I just hate the activity states. A $10 universal remote can't work with my HTPC or with an Echo or Google Home. I just wish it was as good as it could be if they would design it without these weird activity states. <NEW TIER> &gt; Lol dude, I like the harmony. I suggested it to my brother yesterday. I just hate the activity states. A $10 universal remote can't work with my HTPC or with an Echo or Google Home. I just wish it was as good as it could be if they would design it without these weird activity states.

Got it. So in your mind, making the product dumber makes it better. Big Brother would like a word with you. We're done here. <SAME TIER> So how would you design Harmony without an activity state?

If Harmony doesn’t know the state of the input, and input commands are not discreet, how would Harmony tune to the correct one?

Additionally, your Harmony remote can function just like any other universal remote through the “Devices” tab.

There is a “switch inputs” button on the remote. It’s called the activity.

If I am watching TV but want to go to my Chromecast, I push one button for the Chromecast activity. Why would it be more user-friendly to push “Input” x number of times?

 <NEW TIER> &gt; So how would you design Harmony without an activity state?

Press the "Watch TV" activity button and it sends the commands it is supposed to and that's it. No state. It doesn't need a state. The state serves no purpose.

&gt; There is a “switch inputs” button on the remote. It’s called the activity.

Cool, so I press that and it sends a power command to my TV and shuts it off before it tries to switch inputs. Thanks for making this easy Logitech! <NEW TIER> The state serves the purpose of allowing all RF devices to work with Harmony, regardless if they have discrete commands for On/Off or Inout selection.

If a device just has PowerToggle or InputNext, it requires Harmony to know its state...

In your example, I press Watch TV. But my TV was off while I was listening to music. Now my TV turns on but my receiver, previously on for music, turns off.

How does a stateless remote help things? <SAME TIER> Background: My TV was last on HDMI 2 before being turned off. My cable box uses HDMI 1.

I hit “Watch TV” on your stateless version of Harmony. 

How does my TV get set correctly to HDMI 1 if my TV only has InputNext, and does not have a discrete HDMI1 command?

________

If your TV turns off between activities, your Harmony is not configured properly... <NEW TIER> Because I would just switch the input and nothing would turn off. <SAME TIER> So to clarify, its not the activities I hate, I like running a turn tv on. Im not sure how harmony monitors the state of a device however. It's simply running a macro unless it's connected via something else (my older tv was more prone because it wasn't connected to the internet so maybe that's it) but doesn't the harmony just ir blast the screen? So it would only know the state if the state was maitained all in line. In practice I get it, but as you can tell this has sparked a lot of debate so it's not as easy as it seems. I can tell you that when I tell Alexa to turn the TV on, she runs that routine in harmony. Tv on, receiver set to input 1, cable box on. Done. Great. No issues. Now recently if I tell her turn the Xbox on, she seems to get it done. 

Now, because I love remotes, I use the remote it came with. If I hit the Xbox button, receiver goes off, tv goes off, Xbox turns on. Everything gets out of whack so I'm not sure how the hub is montiroing the state. It could be that Alexa is anticipating the need and keeping tabs but I doubt it. My assumption is that harmony doesn't monitor states of the device but rather monitors it's own executions. But it just seems to get out of whack.

That being said, if I'm watching TV and let's say I seitch to my Xbox and then to my firetv it eventually start turning stuff off, not sure why it just does. I only have really three activities, turn tv on, turn Xbox on, watch fire TV (which I dunno why I said watch there but it might as well be turn fire TV on) now the remote state doesn't change, the remote seems to be on the input the last time renote executed the activity. Maybe that's.my issue. <NEW TIER> Sounds like you have your activities configured incorrectly. I suspect your “turn on Xbox” activity only uses the Xbox. Therefore, when you start it, devices not configured for that activity are being turned off.

Instead, your activity should be “Play Xbox” and include your TV, receiver, and any other devices used to play your Xbox.

You should have three activities: Watch TV, Play Xbox, and Watch Fire TV. Each activity should include your TV as a device.

When switching between activities, devices used for the new activity should not be turning off.

The only time my devices ever turn off is when I press power to stop all activities.

The current activity is not stored by Alexa or the Remote. It’s stored in the hub. I can control an activity via voice, remote, or app. The current activity is the same on all 3. <SAME TIER> Nothing turns off when I switch from my “Watch TV” activity to “Chromecast” activity to “Wii U” activity.

My inputs switch appropriately with 1 button press or voice command.

You have your Harmony configured wrong. <NEW TIER> On your devices it doesn't switch off. <NEW TIER> Then your Harmony activity is configured wrong.

If I switch from “Watch TV” to “Play Wii U”, Harmony knows my TV and AVR is already on. The only commands Harmony sends is “Wii U Power On” and “AVR Input HDMI 2”

I also have a “Listen to Music” activity that, regardless of current video input or running activity, sets my AVR to audio setting. This allows me to seamlessly switch between TV/Game Audio and music. Nothing turns off as I click “Watch TV” and “Listen to Music”...

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  6372
JSD SCORE:  0.0
TEXT: 
 HDMI CEC <SUB> Ok, something weird is going on with my hisense TV, I've got an Nvidia shield hooked up and my polk magnifi mini soundbar threw HDMI ARC. 
I've set the shield remote to work with the TV with the IR. 
If i enable CEC on the TV, and turn it off with the remote, it immediately turns back on. If i disable HDMI CEC, the IR stops. 
Any ideas why this could be happening? Could the shield be messing with the TV somehow? <SUB> Did you teach your remote the code for both the TV and the Soundbar? The idea behind CEC is one remote controls devices linked together through one main device. Turn on soundbar, send CEC signal to tv and turns on. Or use TV remote, turns on TV, send CEC signal to soundbar and turns it on. If you have a learning remote sending signals both direct and via CEC, they might get confused. <NEW TIER> Yh i had it to both. But i think it was to do with the sleep function as when i put the shield to sleep, it would turn the TV back on regardless of the soundbar (i tested it without the soundbar plugged to the TV) 
With the TV, i need hdmi CEC enabled to use ARC.
DOCUMENT:  6682
JSD SCORE:  0.06889065430669286
TEXT: 
 Logitech Harmony Smart Control - Difficult To Setup? <SUB> I tried the Logitech Harmony Smart Control over the weekend to simplify my collection of remotes and I already returned it. I wanted it to control my XBOX primarily and got that to work somewhat. It also paired with my DirecTV receiver and I tried to pair it with my LG Soundbar but none of it came together.

My current setup: My XBOX One X is my primary media center. It controls the TV, DirecTV receiver and sound bar. I use an XBOX Media remote which as been OK, mainly the direct on IR that is needed being the big downfall.

I searched for a good tutorial on how to make it work in, well, Harmony and just couldn't do it. It seemed laggy (that is, after a reboot of the XBOX, it seems like the remote wouldn't work for a while) and I never could get it to do the soundbar volume. It might be due to not really understanding what the "activities" are.

I'd like to believe I am pretty good with gadget setup but this was disappointing right out of the box. Any suggestions? <SUB> First, which smart control do you have? Was it a hub with companion remote? Or was it the 650+? Or was it the 350.

If it was the 350, it is a lot more difficult to use, and I would probably have returned it too.

Assuming it was the 650+ IR remote or better.

First: the delay/repeat settings can be customized within the Harmony application. You set them per device. In the harmony software you can click on "Devices" on the left, pick your device, then click "Change Device Settings" and play around with the delay settings. I usually set it to sub 500ms. That should take care of the lag.

Now, you said you created an activity. Each activity has a number of devices, which you seem to have gotten through. But once you create the activity, you now have to choose what each button does within that activity. So if you click on the "Buttons" tab in the software, you can click on the volume button for instance. Then you will have options to choose which device, and which command the volume up button will do. So you can set volume up button to control Device: Soundbar, Command: VolumeUp. 

It sounds like the XBOX is supposed to be receiving/sending out the commands, but Harmony probably has the remote buttons attempting to control each the devices directly. I would check out the buttons tab within the software to see what Device &amp; Command combo each button was controlling, and that will probably solve your issues.
DOCUMENT:  7105
JSD SCORE:  0.079236019804769
TEXT: 
 Help me figure out if this is possible... <SUB> Hi all. So I'm wondering if there is a way to control all my devices with what I have in the following way. But first, here's my equipment:

I have an Echo and an Echo Dot, a harmony hub controlling my entertainment center, a harmony hub controlling my bedroom tv/dvr/appletv, hue lights in both bedroom and living room.

Here's what I want to do:

I want to create a "scene" called "bedtime." So optimally, I would be able to say "Alexa, start bedtime" or something to that effect. When activated, the scene would do this in the living room: Turn the lamp down to 30% and turn off the TV and all associated equipment. In the bedroom, it would: Turn on the TV and all associated equipment, turn the lights on 100%, start my fan that's controlled by the hub.

Right now, I can do all those things individually. Some things through Home, some things through Alexa. I'd really like to get it all done with one command, but I can't figure it out. Ideally, IFTTT would not be involved because it's so buggy but if necessary, I can use that. 

Any ideas? <SUB> I have the exact same setup and do what you're wanting to do through home assistant. I have it setup in a two stage system,  the first part starts my tv,  turns of all my lights except the two bedside lamps which are dim red. 

When I put my phone on my charger it starts part two which turns off the lamps and sets a sleep timer for my t.v. and kodi


TOPIC: 4
KEYWORDS: echo, google, speaker, amazon, google home, alexa, dot, music, audio, apple
REFERENCE COMMENT: 775
TEXT: 
 Google Home AND Alexa everywhere VS whole apartment audio with a high-quality receiver <SUB> So basically after reading a lot, I've decided to go with both Google Home and Alexa as I believe they kinda complement each other.  


That's OK - filling all the rooms with Google Home Minis and Amazon Echo Dots is definitely doable and given coming Black Friday deals it's not even that expensive.  


However, this gets more complicated. I would also like to have a whole apartment audio system - so that I can play music on my DENON/Onkyo/Yamaha/Sony/whatever receiver (with it's 7.2.4 speakers) but also using all my smart speakers in each and every room for it at the same time.  


So far I haven't found any ways of doing that.  


1. DENON only supports HEOS (but I really like DENON!), which means I end up with ridiculous 3 speakers in each and every room (HEOS, GH, Amazon) from which only one plays at any given time. However it has an ethernet port (which is an additional advantage for me), does have a superior sound quality I believe and is fully waterproof.
2. There are some receivers with Chromecast support, which I guess means that I can get the number of devices down to 2 in each and every room but then Amazon Echo is silent and also I'm not 100% sold on GH sound quality.
3. Sonos sounds like a good way to do a multi-room audio, (has an ethernet port), and has Alexa built-in (but it's not fully integrated? like a 1-to-1 replacement?) so that might also get down number of speakers in each and every room down to 2, with hopefully better sound quality then GH+Alexa pair, is splashproof, but it also requires an additional purchase called 'Sonos Connect', right?  


What is the best approach here? <SUB> 100% overkill. What’s the point in having a high quality audio system and pushing it through a shitty speaker? Why would you just go all Echo dots and have an “everywhere” group for audio?  <NEW TIER> because then you have both great audio in your living room for movies/parties AND the sound continues to be with you to a bathroom, etc AND you have a bunch of smart speakers everywhere that you can interact with

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  1766
JSD SCORE:  0.06983869616576513
TEXT: 
 Home vs Echo vs Dot? <SUB> Hey everyone!
I was hoping you all could give me some advice about deciding between these three devices.

The Google Home is attractive because it's cheaper than the Echo, and I'm already somewhat entangled in the Google ecosystem; I already have a subscription to Google Play and use it for most of my music, and I use Google Assistant on my phone all the time. I've heard that although the speaker on Google Home is better than the speaker on Amazon Echo, it's still not great. But to be honest, I'm not really looking for it to be what I turn to when I want to sit in a comfortable chair with a glass of expensive Scotch and get lost in the music. I'm looking for something to play music while I clean the house or make dinner. I have an Oontz Curve speaker that is a totally acceptable quality for that purpose, so if the Google Home speaker can compare to that, that would be fine. I've also heard that Google Home has problems maintaining a connection to Chromecast speakers and will revert to it's own speaker after a song or two. Is that still an issue? It might be moot for me, but still info I'd like to know.

The only advantage I can see for the Echo is that it currently has more skills (but I can't imagine Google won't keep adding skills to Home) and it's more integrated with Amazon. Am I missing something?

The Dot is the real competitor to Google Home for my purposes, if only because of it's price tag. One thing that I'm concerned about with both Echo and Home, is that I live in a three story townhouse, and I don't imagine either of them would be able to hear me from, say, the third or first floor if they were on the second floor, and certainly not from the third floor if they were on the first floor. To that end, two or three Dots would be cheaper/only slightly more expensive than a Home. And if I can connect them to that Oontz Curve, the lack of a speaker isn't an issue. My major concern though is whether they can easily integrate with Google Play or any other Google services, such as Google Assistant. I don't really use any Amazon services other than online shopping, I'm much more integrated into Google, as I said before.

Thanks a bunch in advance. I apologize if this has been asked before, but I searched and the most recent question of this nature I found was seven months ago, and with how quickly these kind of things evolve, I thought it would be worth it to ask again (and inject my own specific situation). Thanks again! <SUB> I've got five Echo Dots, and love them, but the thing that impresses me about Google Home is the continuing conversations you can have with it.  If you ask it a question, it answers, you can ask a follow up question about the same subject.

Right now, Alexa doesn't do that, and it's a little annoying. <NEW TIER> I saw that on a YouTube review of the Home. It's pretty cool and pretty impressive from an NLP and AI standpoint.
DOCUMENT:  529
JSD SCORE:  0.07025022940548073
TEXT: 
 Google home vs Alexa degradation <SUB> I bought a google home and 2 minis last Christmas, and now I already have to restart and yell at all three constantly. Still it doesn't understand or hears me a lot of times. A quick search and it appears I'm not the only one. How are you guy's experience with Alexa so far? Is short life expectancy something to be expected with smarthome speakers?

Update: someone suggested me to factory reset it, holy s*** did it make a difference. Now it's back to I can whisper from across the room and it can hear me clearly.  <SUB> We started with the Echo and now have several Google Homes.  Started purchasing the Home when they were first released.  We now have regular, mini, one Max and some Insigna.

I do have a big family as in 8 kids.   Not had any problem with the Google Homes.  I find they are better at understanding me then the Echo.  

To me it is all about getting what you want with as little work as possible and the Google Home is just better at doing that in my experience.

People talk about how the Google Home is a lot smarter.   But that is not the biggest and more important difference, IMO.   It is being able to say things however you want and even able to mess up and somehow it still figures out what you meant.   Far from perfect but pretty good.  I suspect Google having search is why they are better at doing this.

It is the same with typing something incorrectly into search with all kinds of typos.  It somehow figures out what you probably meant.

I think unless Amazon does a search engine it will be difficult for them to catch up to Google.


DOCUMENT:  5651
JSD SCORE:  0.10739435519029138
TEXT: 
 Music streaming service. <SUB> So today I got my echo plus it’s been pretty awesome so far but the biggest thing for me is probably going to be music. Currently I have tidal. I got into it when sprint bought and it was like six free months I ended up using it a lot building all my playlist than I ended up keeping it and signing with them after the six months. However it doesn’t really work with Alexa unless I use my phone which kind of sucks so what’s my next best option? Amazon unlimited or Spotify? I downloaded a lot of songs for offline use I know unlimited does that also. And also can I connect echo plus to my beats pill xl? So I could basically call out orders and they play over pill or even both devices? <SUB> I have tried Spotify, GPM, Apple Music, Rdio, and a few others. Spotify is easily the best. GPM is probably the best if you watch a lot of YouTube, but strictly for music, Spotify is best.


TOPIC: 16
KEYWORDS: lock, door, smart lock, august, key, unlock, door lock, schlage, front door, front
REFERENCE COMMENT: 3297
TEXT: 
 New Home Owner - Smart Lock Questions <SUB> Hello!  I bought a home on Monday and I need to change out the locks.  Currently, each door has the deadbolt and door knob with a lock.  To get in, I unlock the deadbolt, then insert the key into the door knob and turn the door knob.  

I am looking at the Schlage Connect which replaces the deadbolt.  What do I do about the other lock? Does that just go away and become a normal door knob with no lock?

Thank you for your time! <SUB> I simply replaced the knob with a non locking version and went with the Yale smart  lock deadbolt. Very similar to the Schlage. 

I initially left the locking knob on but out of habit I was locking it on the way out. 

This became annoying and counter productive to having the smart lock. 

I merely bought a matching closet knob to replace the original locking knob. 

RELATED COMMENTS: 
DOCUMENT:  3876
JSD SCORE:  0.12435537334837711
TEXT: 
 Smart lock with little clearance <SUB> Howdy.

I'm dealing with a bit of a head-scratcher. I have an August smart pro on my front door (which I love), and now we're hoping to set up a smart lock for our back door.

Unfortunately, there is very little clearance from the deadbolt to the window frame (like the door in this photo: http://www.furnitureteams.com/49bba803d793e73d.html). We were hoping to install an August and I've come across the odd photo with an August on a similar door, but I'm not sure how they pulled it off (given that the locking wings would be interfered with).

Any ideas as to how to make it work? I suppose I could try and swap the knob and lock position in a worst case scenario.

Any help would be muchly appreciated.

Thanks! <SUB> The deadbolt and the door knob holes are interchangeable on most doors.  You can likely move the door handle up to the deadbolt hole.  Then you will have to remove the deadbolt plate on the door frame, and add a strike plate instead.  That will require doing a little trimming work on the door frame, usually a razor blade knife takes a few seconds.

The door pictured does appear to have oversized strike plates on both sides.  They can stay, even though they wont be used.  likely you will also need to drill a deeper hole, and longer screws in the door frame for the deadbolt as well.

Obligatory, just a suggestion not a recommendation, I haven't seen your door to know for certain.  But I have done this with other doors (added a storm door, storm door handle would hit the entry door handle so swapped them.)
DOCUMENT:  736
JSD SCORE:  0.12718946361763347
TEXT: 
 August Smart Lock questions (comparing against Kevo Kwikset) <SUB> We're about to replace our front door, which seems like as good a time as any to install a smart lock. I've narrowed it down to the August Smart Lock and the Kevo Kwikset (with Plus hub). I'm leaning towards the Kevo because our car has touch-to-unlock handles that I've come to really enjoy and I like the idea of the same on our front door. Interoperability with Alexa and Nest sounds nice too. (Other smart devices I've got: Smartthings, Lutron Caseta, Philips Hue, and I'm getting a Ring Pro for the new door as well.)

However, there's a lot of August love out there. I guess my real question is: For you August owners, what's your setup like? What are the interesting Smarttthings routines you're using? <SUB> Thanks for all the feedback! You guys talked me out of the Kwikset Kevo and into a Schlage Connect. (We also looked at the Yale Assure but the tipping factors were the ANSI rating and my wife slightly preferred the aesthetic on the Schlage.)
DOCUMENT:  1593
JSD SCORE:  0.1453099102245453
TEXT: 
 Smart Deadbolts <SUB> Hi all, those that have installed smart deadbolts, what do you do with your door handles? Do you have models that replace the handle as well or do you leave your non-smart handle unlocked all the time?

I'm thinking of getting the Kwikset Obsidian with Zwave and made my think of my dumb handle and what to do with it. <SUB> My door had one of the thumb press handles, so it didn't lock anyway. I swapped the deadbolt for one with the same finish, and they look like they are meant to be a pair.  I would have replaced it with a non locking handle if it had been one with a lock. I had previously replaced the plate screws on the jam with 3" screws. So I'm not worried about only the deadbolt being locked. 

Locks only keep honest people out anyway. If someone wants in my home there are windows that would be easier than kicking a door in. Like my smart thermostat, I see the smart Lock about convenience first and foremost.  Now the kids don't need keys, and I get a notification on my phone when they unlock the door.

from IPython.core.display import display, HTML
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1	18.0	0.5132	switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimme...	Looking for switches that I can control with A...
2	19.0	0.8230	device, hub, go, wifi, thing, automation, good...	Best Roomba Alternatives - Cheaper, Stronger &...
3	18.0	0.6306	switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimme...	240v Light Dimming options? <SUB> I have Light...
4	18.0	0.7139	switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimme...	Looking for dimmers for my setup. <SUB> I’m br...
5	7.0	0.3132	turn, google, tv, control, alexa, app, light, ...	Question on smart plugs at my office <SUB> Hey...
6	18.0	0.3253	switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimme...	Trajectio: inexpensive motion powered Hue ligh...
7	7.0	0.5926	turn, google, tv, control, alexa, app, light, ...	Stringify shutting down <SUB> nan <SUB> I need...
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9	9.0	0.2256	sensor, house, system, thermostat, nest, go, m...	Getting Alexa to recognize Nest thermostat <SU...

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7100	5.0	0.6189	door, garage, garage door, open, opener, door ...	Alternative to MyQ garage opener? <SUB> I look...
4145	7.0	0.9802	turn, google, tv, control, alexa, app, light, ...	Walmart is offering the $59.99 harmony hub dea...
7020	9.0	0.9413	sensor, house, system, thermostat, nest, go, m...	HVAC guy said Nest Thermostats are bad for Fur...
4742	11.0	0.5490	plug, smart plug, outlet, strip, smart outlet,...	Dumb question and not sure where it goes, wine...
6543	15.0	0.7237	camera, cam, outdoor, record, arlo, security c...	Recommendations for security cameras that reco...
3297	16.0	0.7322	lock, door, smart lock, august, key, unlock, d...	New Home Owner - Smart Lock Questions <SUB> He...
6230	18.0	0.9458	switch, light, bulb, hue, control, turn, dimme...	Switch I bought won't work, bulbs the solution...
3327	19.0	0.9525	device, hub, go, wifi, thing, automation, good...	SmartThing Support is asking me to open ports ...

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INTERFER MEANING¶

Informative topics - categories:¶

Summary output:¶

Find the topic with the highest contribution for each document:¶

Example:¶

Find the most representative document for each topic in order to infer the topic:¶

Example:¶

Return the topics based on a word query¶

Topic distribution across documents¶

Word coluds of Top N Keywords in Each Topic¶

Plot word counts and the weights of each keyword in the same chart¶

Jensen-Shannon Distance¶